Judah The Engineer, Part 2

On May 23, 1862, in the Battle of Front Royal during the American Civil War, Captain William Goldsborough captured and imprisoned Charles Goldsborough. They were brothers. The battle marked the only time in U.S. history that regiments from the same state, Maryland, fought against each other.

Judah had a half-brother named Joseph from his father’s second wife, Rachel. Judah, along with his nine other brothers, hated Joseph. Joseph was pampered by their father, Joseph was a tattletale, Joseph was a goody two- shoes. When Joseph innocently relayed his strange dreams, which seemed to foretell his rise to power over his own family, the brothers taunted him enviously, “Shall you indeed reign over us? Or shall you indeed have dominion over us?” (Genesis 37:8).

So when Joseph, on instruction from their father, visited his older brothers, the siblings “conspired against him to kill him” (v. 18). Though Reuben succeeded in delaying their scheme, once he had left, Judah came up with what he thought was a marvelous idea.

“What profit is there if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Come and let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother and our flesh” (vv. 26, 27).

Whether Judah’s conscience had smitten him is debatable; what is not is his callous knack for capitalizing upon human suffering, and that of his own family member no less. Thus, Joseph was sold, and their father fed a lie about wild animals and Joseph’s bloody coat (vv. 31–33).

Over two decades passed, and the brothers’ homeland in Canaan was now ravaged with famine. They had no more crops, no more food. They would starve to death slowly but surely. No clever scheming could get them out of this disaster. There was but one hope—Egypt, the one place that still had a supply of grain. On their father’s command, the 10 brothers started the long and arduous journey to the foreign land, leaving behind their youngest brother, Benjamin, whom Rachel had died giving birth to and whom their father, now that Joseph was gone, treasured all the more.

What awaited them in Egypt would be the surprise of their lives.

Reflect: Do you dislike someone you know you should love? Should our feelings dictate our treatment of people with whom we do not get along?

Key Bible Texts

But he that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his eyes. (1 John 2:11 KJV)